Utah allows guns on college campuses

Utah allows guns on college campuses

news.yahoo.com

"It's not that I run around scared all day long, but if something happens to me, I do want to be prepared," said the 24-year-old business major, who has a concealed-weapons permit and takes the handgun everywhere but church. After the massacre at Virginia Tech that left 33 dead, some have suggested that the carnage might have been lower if a student or professor with a gun had stepped in.

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Now I'm not against someone protect themselves, However some of the kids are really young.

Do they know what it will really take to pull that trigger to save their own life?

Are they ready to deal with what’s going to be playing over and over in their mind afterwards?

Even trained officers and military men have trouble when they have to take another man’s life. It’s not easy thing to do. I just hope each and everyone who carries won’t have to use it, and if they do their able to handle the consciences afterwards.

news.yahoo.com
(visit the link for the full news article)

This is not a good idea in my opinion.

While I may support a persons right to own guns, there are certain places
that I don't believe guns should be allowed, apart from by trained security
officials, and schools are one of them.

Kooks will always get guns whether they are banned or not.
The only people disarmed will be the honest and socially responsible.

I see no reason why a school principal or others in charge can't be trained and armed for just such emergencies.

But If the kids in Utah are armed and they don't all go on rampages then it proves that 99.9% of young people are responsible gun owners, does it not?

Yes, I think most American’s are responsible gun owner’s. That’s not the problem. The problem is, will they emotionally be able to handle what just happen afterwards.

Like I said even your train professionals have trouble taking someone’s life. It’s not easy to pull the trigger on another human being.

Originally posted by Shar

Even trained officers and military men have trouble when they have to take another man’s life. It’s not easy thing to do. I just hope each and everyone who carries won’t have to use it, and if they do their able to handle the consciences afterwards.

Shar,
I think you are making a good point here. I hope those points will be made when going through the process to carry a weapon.

Shar I totally agree with you. Im not against people owning guns but I do not think School should not be a place for kids to have to feel threatened enough to have the need to carry a concealed weapon. Perhaps maybe a Taser or something non-lethal in case a bad judgement call is made or perhaps something gets blown out of proportion and tempers fly.At least with a taser, you know no one will die accidentally and if a crisis does arise, the piece of crap can't blow his own brains out and get out of it so easy like Cho did.

ThePieMan,

You bring up a very good point here. A totally different direction.

However, even with tasers would you be able to tase before he kills?

Still I would think with enough tasers around you should be able to get him to drop the gun before there’s a mass of killings, like we have seen before.

I think this is the best idea yet. Enough people tases him and he’ll go down and kids won’t have the problem on their hands that they just shot and killed someone.

Tasers are Ok, but they don't have the necessary range or capabilities,
now a microwave gun, that'll stop them dead in there tracks without
doing any real harm to them.

Its so unfair that coward escaped so easily. His poor family is left behind to bear the guilt of his crime. What a piece of ----- coward he was. He should have just slit his wrists or something instead of doing what he did.

Hey I live in Utah and this is not some 'new' law. It is just being talked about because of the recent events at Virginia Tech.

Carrying a concealed weapon on a collage campus has been the standing tradition for a long time in Utah. We Utah people like our guns.

Nobody is going berzerk and shooting at each other.........so far so good.

PLUS the added bonus of any person who might want to commit unlawfull gunplay on the campus must deal with KNOWING that others ARE armed, and I think this creates a threat for the crazy person. Only a COWARD goes around shooting at others who are unarmed, and it would take a brave soul indeed to try such a thing on a Utah collage campus. Brave people do not go on shooting rampages I think because of such a law the chances are SLIGHT that any gunman would be able to kill in the numbers that happened at V.Tech.

Not all the students are armed for goodness sakes............only the ones who have gone through gun safty classes and can pass the tests that allow for the permit for carrying a concealed weapon. So it would stem to reason that the gun carriers are pretty well aquainted with burden they carry, and doubtful they would just pull the gun and shoot someone for a better place in line at the cafateria.

[edit on 28-4-2007 by theRiverGoddess]

Only a COWARD goes around shooting at others who are unarmed,

That statement is so, so truthful.

So it would stem to reason that the gun carriers are pretty well aquainted with burden they carry, and doubtful they would just pull the gun and shoot someone for a better place in line at the cafateria.

True. I don't believe anyone on here thinks they will. However, no matter how you look at it. I think if a "normal" person such as you or I would have to take someone's life it's going to weigh heavy on our shoulders.

Originally posted by theRiverGoddess
Hey I live in Utah and this is not some 'new' law. It is just being talked about because of the recent events at Virginia Tech.

Carrying a concealed weapon on a collage campus has been the standing tradition for a long time in Utah. We Utah people like our guns.

Nobody is going berzerk and shooting at each other.........so far so good.

PLUS the added bonus of any person who might want to commit unlawfull gunplay on the campus must deal with KNOWING that others ARE armed, and I think this creates a threat for the crazy person...

Not all the students are armed for goodness sakes............only the ones who have gone through gun safty classes and can pass the tests that allow for the permit for carrying a concealed weapon. So it would stem to reason that the gun carriers are pretty well aquainted with burden they carry, and doubtful they would just pull the gun and shoot someone for a better place in line at the cafateria.

theRiverGoddess...you are absolutely right.

My father used to be a range officer at a gun club. He would say that when everyone was armed you never saw more people be polite to one another.

The 31 states that have "shall issue" laws allowing private citizens to carry concealed weapons have, on average, a 24 percent lower violent crime rate, a 19 percent lower murder rate and a 39 percent lower robbery rate than states that forbid concealed weapons. In fact, the nine states with the lowest violent crime rates are all right-to-carry states. Remarkably, guns are used for self-defense more than 2 million times a year, three to five times the estimated number of violent crimes committed with guns.

Source:Gun Control: Myths & Realities

With the required firearms safety classes and the verification of a clean police record, there is no reason why citizens (not resident aliens) should be prevented from carrying a concealed weapon. Doing so does in fact serve as a strong deterrent to mass murderers in preventing the slaughter of many innocents - like the recent massacre at Virginia Tech.

Just sitting here thinking, when I was a high-schooler, it was a common sight for a truck to have a rifle-rack in the rear window, complete with rifle, in the school parking lot. Guys would leave directly from school and go hunting. Nobody thought it was unusual.

Times have changed, I guess. It only takes a few incidents to change society's attitude toward something.

yeah, I was always use to that as well. My dad hunted and fished. He always had guns around. He had a gun rack in his truck with some guns hanging on it. Of course that's not including the ones in the house. I hardly see that type of thing anymore. Maybe I just don't pay attention. I don't know.

Believe it or not, most high schools used to have gun ranges in their basements. I know mine did, but it was abandoned and sealled off by the time I got there.

Guns at college?!??!! This is crazy! Do you know what goes on during the weekends at college? Drinking, drugs, parties, fights, and LOTS of people....by allowing guns on campus they are setting themselves up for potential drunken shootouts every weekend. I mean, if a guy gives you some crap at a party and you are really drunk and are carrying a weapon, you'd pull that thing out and try to intimidate him a little bit, which may lead to pulling the trigger. This is a really really stupid idea

Well...ain't that that the level of chaos needed....and than “Ex Chaos Ordo“ - more security...more surveillance...etc...

The students options in a terrorist situation is to watch all of their classmates get gunned down by some maniac and not be able to do anything and then run like hell for their lives or they get to pull out their own gun and fire back. Either way, they are going to have psychological issues. Maybe with the guns they will have some trauma to deal with but they won’t be dead. I guess we will have to see how this experiment plays out.

Well, the way I see it is that, if everyone is armed for the purpose of self-defense, then any would-be aggressor would be facing situations much like this one.